Background of the Problem

Translating Indonesian literary works such as novel to foreign languages holds such an important impact. In addition, translating Indonesian literary works is able to tell the avid readers that there is a beautiful nation called Indonesia, there is also a chance to promote its culture to the international world. Promoting Indonesian culture to other foreign readers has its way to promote the country as a whole. One exact example is the purpose of Yayasan Lontar Jakarta which has a goal to promote Indonesia through its literary works. One of the projects of Yayasan Lontar is a novel entitled Para Priyayi which is translated in English as Javanese Gentry by Vladilav Zhukov. This novel contains very thick culturally-bound expressions. This novel tells about the life of several noble men. The setting of the novel took place in 1900s in Java at that time. Therefore, this novel is like a story of several people with their condition and life problems in their culture which is written in a Javanese way. The great quantity of Javanese expressions influences the high rank of the culture gap. It also impacts the essence of the translated text which is a crucial point in translation scope. Referring to those points, it challenges the researcher to analyze the novel. This novel shows the life of indigenous of Javanese people at that time, not only the name of the things written which are totally Javanese but also the conversation and the style of this novel. For Indonesian readers who are not native of Javanese, it might cause some confusion with some parts of this novel, and there is a possibility for foreign readers to encounter some difficulties while reading this novel. Beside that problem, the researcher also wants to find out further whether the ideology that is adopted by the translator is in line with promoting cultural goals of the institution or not. The chosen ideology that the translator adopted holds an important impact for the literary itself whether it is foreignization or domestication. It holds an important point in deciding towards what kind of direction the translation will be. Foreignization is the way to choose author as the orientation, on the other hand domestication is the way to leave the author because the translator chooses the target readers as the main orientation Venuti, 1995. Finally, the researcher wants to analyze foreignization and domestication in the culturally-bound expressions in Umar Kayam‘s Para Priyayi in the English version entitled Javanese Gentry. Later, the researcher also wants to look up the degree of the meaning equivalence in the culturally-bound expressions this novel represented in its English version.

B. Focus and Formulation of the Problem

The Para Priyayi novel greatly deals with culturally-bound expressions. There are many culturally-bound expressions in this novel especially in terms of Javanese culture can easily be found. Highly culturally-bound expressions provided are the product of Javanese culture. It can be in expression of greetings, items or even the specific terminology for something. The example is ―klepon” which is translated to ―klepon, steamed rice-cakes with a center of palm sugar”, the translator adds the extra definition that ―klepon” with ―steamed rice-cakes with a center of palm sugar ‖. Foreign readers may get confused if there is no more explanation about “klepon”. It is a fact that Javanese people have a complicated system in their language usage depending on the situation and participants in the dialogue. As sequence, the great quantity of culturally-bound expressions should get more attention from the researcher. To gain the sense of the transferred message especially in a novel, a translator has the consideration to choose the way whether it is foreignization or domestication. The foreignization or domestication will bring the tendency to keep the source culture or to give easier ways to target readers. It will also have influences such as to reduce the essence of source text or to lose the fully understanding of target readers depending on the selected way from the translator. Thus, to deliver the message of culturally-bound expressions, meaning equivalence is also needed to examine whether it is equivalent or not. Meaning equivalence has a significant influence in the essence of the translated text. If the meaning is equal, the target readers will also get both good understanding and good information. Based on the problem formulation gathered, this research concerns to analyze the representation of foreignization and domestication in the culturally- bound expressions. Then, this research also analyzes the degree of meaning equivalence of the translated of culturally-bound expressions. Therefore, the problems of this study are formulated as follows. 1. How are foreignization and domestication of the culturally-bound expressions in Kayam‘s Para Priyayi novel represented in Zhukof‘s Javanese Gentry translated novel?